OT: THe Dark Knight Rises by Greg Cox

Nolan stated before the movie came out that out of respect he would not mention Joker. I kind of like the fact that the Joker could still be locked up in Arkham. Besides which The Joker Blogs are doing a fine job of showing what Joker has been doing in between "The Dark Knight" and "The Dark Knight Rises"

^^ I just assumed that, in keeping with Nolan's more realistic take on the Bat-verse, the Joker had either been executed by the state or was put on death row for his crimes in The Dark Knight in-between the films, or that he was incarcerated in a maximum-security prison, far outside of Gotham.

Realistically, a lot of jurisdictions would probably be going after the Joker for his crimes. The most obvious, of course, being the City of Gotham (or perhaps Gotham is a combination city-county like San Francisco?). But he also attacked the state's Army National Guard units when he attempted his little "social experiment" on the ferries. (Traditionally, Gotham in the comics has been seen in Batman fandom as being part of New Jersey, so I'm gonna go with that.) So the New Jersey Attorney General is definitely gonna want a piece of him -- assuming the feds don't want in on the action. (The Army National Guard units in The Dark Knight look like they're still working for the state and haven't been federalized, though.)

Since New Jersey abolished the death penalty in 2007, my guess is that the Joker (in the Nolan-verse, his real identity was probaby eventually discovered, unlike in the comics -- realistically, it's kind of hard to conceal your identity, especially when you have such prominent facial scars) is sitting pretty in the New Jersey State Prison during Bane's coup in The Dark Knight Rises.

If we place Nolan's Gotham outside of New Jersey -- if we take its similarities to Chicago to mean that it's in Illinois, or its similarities to Manhattan to mean it's in New York State -- then the Joker is probably either in Tamms Correctional Center or in Sing Sing Correctional Faciity. Neither state has a death penalty.

I recall the Atlas of the DC Universe putting Gotham in New Jersey, but in the Young Justice universe (Earth-16), it's in Connecticut. The Gotham City of the '66 Batman sitcom was in Gotham State, and it was a blatant pastiche of NYC, with gag place names (Avenue of the Armenias), surrogates for NYC landmarks, and a mayor and governor named for those of New York City and State at the time (Mayor Linseed = Lindsay, Governor Stonefellow = Rockefeller), and its exteriors were routinely represented by stock footage of Manhattan.

I recall the Atlas of the DC Universe putting Gotham in New Jersey, but in the Young Justice universe (Earth-16), it's in Connecticut. The Gotham City of the '66 Batman sitcom was in Gotham State, and it was a blatant pastiche of NYC, with gag place names (Avenue of the Armenias), surrogates for NYC landmarks, and a mayor and governor named for those of New York City and State at the time (Mayor Linseed = Lindsay, Governor Stonefellow = Rockefeller), and its exteriors were routinely represented by stock footage of Manhattan.

Click to expand...

Yeah, Gotham's been put all over the place in various media adaptations of it over the years. And in Batman: The Animated Series, I seem to remember it was explicitly placed on a map as being where New York City is found. But when I was active in online Batman fandom about 12 years ago, the general fan consensus -- and this was not canonical or definitive; it was just what most of fandom seemed to agree upon -- was that it's in New Jersey. A cursory look at the Batman Wiki's entry on Gotham City would seem to indicate that that's still the fandom consensus. In fact, a user named "Doomlurker" adapted the map of Gotham DC Comics created for their No Man's Land arc in 1999 by adding it to a Google Maps image of New Jersey, placing Gotham in Atlantic County in Southern New Jersey, near the Great Bay. I'll put it in spoiler tag so that it doesn't stretch the screen.

What amused me about The Atlas of the DC Universe was that it put Metropolis, presumably the largest city in the DCU's America, in Delaware, the smallest state. Would there be any Delaware left?

Anyway, I've always felt Metropolis shouldn't be that close to Gotham, because if they're neighbors, what's to stop Superman from popping over and taking down the Joker on his lunch break? True, Superman is often portrayed as fast enough to get anywhere on Earth in moments, but at least a greater distance would make it seem less obviously problematical. I'd considered making Metropolis a West Coast city, though of course Smallville put it in Kansas so it would be close to the title locale.

The DC Atlas is a fun book to look at, but there was an RPG module released not long after that took the general idea of NJ and Delaware as rote, but instead of placing them where they were there, decided that in the DC universe Newark NJ and DE don't exist and Gotham and Metropolis stand in their stead. What's funny is that Newark NJ is a very Gotham-y town. But for myself, I usually place Gotham in NY and Metropolis in Chicago.

I will admit to some bias in favour of the New Jersey locale, having made reference to it when co-writing the Daily Planet Guide to Gotham for West End Games back in 2000. I rationalized it by referring to Shadow of the Bat Annual # 1. A murder victim's driver's license explicitly refers to "Gotham City, NJ" therein.

As for the efforts of "Doomurker", they're certainly impressive. I do wish that "Doomurker" had made allowance for Blüdhaven's "next-door neighbour" status.

My personal opinion on Metropolis, unsanctioned by DC: the comics' version is in Rhode Island. Or it was from 1986 to 2011. After Flashpoint...?

Long story for my Rhode Island rationale, involving the location of the Justice League's original cave HQ near Happy Harbor, itself in RI, and also within direct line of sight of the Metropolis skyline. Also, the Legion-era map of Metropolis during the Levitz-Giffen years has a role in this...

I just checked DC Comics Database wiki, and it has Gotham in New Jersey, and Metropolis in New York state.
And just for the hell of it I looked at the other major cities. Star City and Coast City are in California, and Central City is in Missouri.

Two reasons that DC set Metropolis on the Delaware coast: its proximity to New Jersey (Gotham City and Metropolis were linked by bridges at the time), and Smallville being set in rural Maryland. This was before John Byrne's reboot which officially put Smallville in Kansas, where it's been ever since.